


The Mistletoe Extortion Incident

by argle_fraster



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Hogwarts Era, Mistletoe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-12
Updated: 2008-12-12
Packaged: 2017-11-29 06:12:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/683753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/argle_fraster/pseuds/argle_fraster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the mistletoe near the Great Hall becomes too much to deal with, Ginny seeks out a way around it and makes an unlikely alliance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Mistletoe Extortion Incident

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written in 2008.

"If we get caught, we'll have detention for sure," Colin moaned, glancing down the hall like a skittish kneazle. "I don't fancy having to scrub cauldrons again this week."

"Hush," Ginny admonished, tapping her wand against the handle. The wooden door swung open easily with a loud creak, and the sound echoed through the corridor. Colin winced, looking positively ashen with fear, and Ginny tried to ignore the warning bells going off in her own head.

"Please," Colin wheezed. "Can't we just forget this whole thing?"

"No!" Ginny replied. She peeked around the door into the Potions classroom; abandoned, as it should be, during such a late time in the evening. The grime on the desks looked darker with the absence of light. She put one step inside, half expecting something to jump out at her– with Snape, one could never tell what nastiness awaited unsuspecting students inside. When it was clear that there were no booby-traps to catch students sneaking in after curfew, she continued. "I'm not getting caught under that blasted mistletoe again."

"It's tradition!" Colin said. "It happens every year! I think you'll miss it if you go through with this!"

"Just yesterday you were complaining about getting stuck under it with Bulstrode again," Ginny hissed. "Now, stop acting like a Hufflepuff and come in here to help me."

"I don't even think this crazy scheme will work," Colin sniffed, but followed her anyway, and together they crept through the empty Potions classroom, keeping close to the walls. Snape kept only the bare-bones of his stash in the classroom itself, and Ginny wasn't dense enough to try to go after his private stores. She was banking on finding what she needed in the cabinets near the back corners.

The cabinets came open easily, and Ginny peered inside, whispering a _Lumos_ to help see the labels. Snape's scrawl was hard to read on papers, let alone on the curving surface of glass beakers, but she found the one she was looking for nestled near the back, gathering a bit of cobwebs.

"Here," she said, pulling out the bottle with an air of triumph. "Got it."

"Good," Colin whispered, pained. "Can we go now?"

"Sissy," Ginny hissed, but shut the cabinet doors quickly, and wasted no time in leaving the classroom.

After all, she didn't fancy detention much, either.

\------

"It says– wait, here– it says stir clockwise three times," Ginny read, nose-deep in the Potions book.

"Clockwise?" Colin asked. He sounded doubtful. "Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure," she answered, glancing down at the concoction brewing in front of them. It was a sickly brown color, and burping up bubbles that filled the air with a nasty odor– but, after all, the appearance of a potion very rarely reflected what the potion was going to be doing, and as long as they got the instructions right, Ginny would be pleased with the effort.

"Wait," Colin said. "You mean, three times after the one I just did?"

"What one you just did?" Ginny asked, blinking at him.

"I just stirred in the beeswax," he explained. "So do I stir it three times _more_ , or was one of the stirs counted in the last ingredient I added?"

Ginny peered at the book again, squinting.

"I don't know," she answered. "It doesn't say."

"Well how am I supposed to know how many times to stir, then?" Colin demanded.

"Just do it!" Ginny said. "Honestly!"

"I knew we should have asked Hermione," he sighed, dejected looking, glaring down at the potion that was the bane of their troubles. "She'd know for sure."

"Well, we didn't," Ginny said peevishly, "so buck up and stir it."

"How many times?"

"Three!"

He did as he was told, and the potion began burping up more bubbles, each one sounding a bit like a toad. Ginny and Colin stood over the boiling cauldron, watching it roil and tumble in on itself. There seemed to be no sign coming from the liquid– if they had done it right, they would only know after testing it.

"You go first," Colin said, and Ginny couldn't blame him; the potion looked a bit like bile, and smelled the same as well.

"Fine," she said, hoping she sounded far braver than she was actually feeling. She reached down to take a hold of the ladle, and scooped up a large spoonful. It looked even worse close up, so she squeezed her eyes shut and sipped a bit from the curved side. It tasted just like it smelled, and she wanted to retch.

By some miracle of fate, she managed to choke a mouthful down.

"Well?" Colin asked, when, after a few long moments, nothing had happened.

"I don't know," Ginny admitted, replacing the ladle in the cauldron once more.

"How do we know if it worked?"

"We try it out," she sighed, grim.

\-------

They stood outside the Great Hall, eyeing the colorful decor contained within. It wasn't that Ginny didn't _like_ the Christmas decorations; the Head of Houses had done a very good job at making the Great Hall festive and welcoming, and she actually was a big fan of the holiday itself, and all the cheer included. It was just that blasted mistletoe dangling from the double doors leading inside, mocking them with its green and red-ness, and it's stupid magical properties. Ginny glared at it, hoping the powers of her brain would cause it to burst into flame on the spot.

"So," Colin said, giving her a shove from behind, "go on!"

"Wait," she said, digging her heels into the ground. "We have to find a suitable test subject!"

"You _are_ the test subject," he said, dryly, and she wanted to kick backwards.

"Not me!" she screeched. "I mean to get stuck under with me!"

All too late she saw Ernie Macmillan walking out from the Hall, and Colin managed to get her underneath the overarch of the doors at the same time. Her heels clacked against the floor as she involuntarily scooted forward to smack her lips against his, and she felt like crying when she saw the besotted, starry-eyed expression on his face afterwards.

"Bullocks," Colin swore behind her. "No dice."

\--------

Luna joined them the next day, after getting stuck twice with Vincent Crabbe.

"Try adding the beeswax _before_ the wormwort," she said, in her annoyingly unflappable way.

"We still don't know how many times we are supposed to be stirring this," Colin argued, and Ginny ignored him. "We could end up hexing our own lips off or something!"

"And would that really be such a problem?" Ginny demanding, glaring across the bubbling cauldron at him. "Bulstrode, Colin. Bulstrode."

She was pleased when he shrank back significantly, and she continued stirring.

\-------

Another failed attempt, and they were back in the classroom the next night, along with Lavender Brown and Seamus Finnegan, who kept getting each other, and Susan Bones, who had gotten both Finch-Fletchey and Macmillan.

"It was so awful!" Susan was crying, into her hands. "He tried to stick his tongue in my mouth!"

"Isn't that against the rules?" Lavender asked, glaring at Seamus, who looked about ready to vomit into the cauldron. Ginny shooed him away; she most definitely did not need to have to make another batch. It was late enough, and the room was getting a bit crowded.

"It can't be that bad," Colin argued. "I think Millicent is lying in wait for me. How could it be that _every time_ I go in for dinner, she's right there?!"

"I can't believe Dumbledore let's this go," Luna mused, eyes staring off at something in the distance that only she could see. "It seems a bit–"

"Tarty?" Ginny supplied, putting in a handful of herbs and sniffing at the rising bubbles.

"Sick-making," Lavender moaned.

\-------

Ginny ran into a red-faced Padma Patil as she was scurrying to catch the tail-end of dinner, and the girl nearly bowed right into her.

"Oh, no," Ginny said, as she struggled to keep her balance. "You, too?"

"You need a proper potion-maker," Padma ground out between clenched teeth. "I'll see what I can do. Tonight?"

"As always," Ginny replied, and watched the girl stomp away down the corridor.

\-------

"I think you _liked_ kissing Boot!" Henry was yelling, and Ginny could hear his voice before she even got the to empty classroom where they kept the cauldron. In fact, there were so many voices inside the room she could barely distinguish them all, and as she slipped inside, she got a nasty start– apparently, the number of people upset by the enchanted mistletoe was doubling daily.

And word had gotten out about the attempts at finding an antidote for the charm.

"I didn't!" Susan wailed. "It was the mistletoe!"

"You never get that look on your face when you kiss _me_!" Henry shot back. Ginny leveled a nasty glare at Padma.

"Did you have to tell the whole school?" she asked.

"I didn't tell Henry," Padma said, with an apologetic shrug. "And I couldn't get Hermione."

"Bother," Ginny sighed, moving towards the cauldron. "Now what?"

She was surprised to see a couple of Slytherins loitering near the back, looking murderous; apparently Daphne Greengrass disliked having to kiss Crabbe as much as Luna did.

"Anyone willing to help, step forward," Ginny called, grabbing the book they were using for the recipe. "It's going to be a long night."

\--------

The next night, the number of students crammed into the classroom had doubled on itself, and Ginny could barely wedge her way in-between the bodies to even enter.

She was surprised to find herself face to face with Draco Malfoy, whose expression bordered on thunderous.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, too shocked to attempt to be nasty.

"Mistletoe works on members of the same sex," he ground out, eyes shifting from side to side. Ginny would have laughed, except she'd realized the same thing at breakfast when it caught her with Marietta Edgecomb.

"Good, then," she said, "you can help me with the potion."

"Don't you think that if this worked, someone would have marketed it by now?" he replied, following her to the cauldron. "It's a lost cause."

"You're here, aren't you?" Ginny pointed out. He didn't have a retort, and she handed him the leather-bound Potions book. "Get reading."

"–didn't have to find her later on!" Lavender was shouting, near the front of the classroom.

"It was the mistletoe!" Dean retorted, and Lavender hit him on the arm with a balled fist.

"It doesn't work outside of the Great Hall!" she cried, tears glistening on her cheeks. "You were in the _Astronomy Tower_!"

Ginny cast a side-long glance at Draco, whose top lip had curled in disgust.

"Read," she reminded him, tapping the book. "Or you're here again tomorrow."

\-------

He was, of course, and so were the rest of them, including Astoria Greengrass, who seemed to have only shown up with the intent to hang on Malfoy's arm as he read through the instructions. He kept trying to shake her off, but nothing was working, and Ginny had to stifle her laughter as she stirred the boiling liquid.

"Look, this is just silly," he said, glaring at the book. "Let's just substitute Dragon's Blood for the wormwort."

"Will that work?" Ginny asked, surprised. "Doesn't that change the properties of the potion?"

"It makes it more potent," Malfoy said. He frowned at the cauldron and tapped his toe against the nearest desk in thought. "Dragon's Blood enhances the magical properties of the ingredients it is used with– fortifies them, if you will."

"Alright," Ginny conceded. It couldn't hurt to try; nothing else was working, anyway. She reached for the bottle at the same time Malfoy did, and they nearly knocked heads over it. He gave her a funny look and pulled away, and Astoria went back to her odd cooing noises while rubbing her hand over his forehead.

"If this doesn't work, I'm eating a Puking Pastille," Colin sighed, looking forlorn and miserable from his seat beside Ginny. Ginny felt bad for him– Millicent Bulstrode was still _not_ one of the people to show up looking for an antidote.

\--------

Malfoy showed up the next day with arms full of ingredient bottles and several sachets of herbs.

"We will figure this out," he hissed. "If I have to kiss Astoria one more time–"

"Ew," Ginny said, wrinkling her face in disgust. "Spare me, please."

He thrust a large, oblong-shaped bottle in her direction.

"Use this," he all but demanded. Ginny took the beaker gingerly, and glanced in it. Whatever was inside was almost glittering, and she could not recall seeing anything remotely similar to it in her time in the Potions classroom.

"What in Merlin's pants is this?" she asked.

"Faerie Essence."

She gaped at him, unashamed.

"Where did you _get_ this?" she gasped.

"Snape's private stash," came the answer. When she could only stare at him, he shrugged. "Seems that the mistletoe works on teachers, too, and he didn't fancy cozying up to Minerva anymore–"

"Ew!" Ginny said again, covering her face with her free hand. "Alright, alright! Enough, already. I don't want to lose my dinner."

She approached the cauldron, moving her way through the bodies occupying the classroom. The general demeanor had gotten quite a bit more morose; even couples didn't feel much like snogging anymore, with all the kissing.

"Before or after the Dragon's Blood?" she asked.

"Before."

Ginny eyed him warily.

"You sure are helpful," she said, voice low. "Just to make sure, you should probably be the test subject tomorrow."

"What's the matter?" Malfoy sneered. "Don't trust me?"

"Not at all," she said, too tired to lie.

"Fine," he said. "I'll do it."

\-------

Ginny ran into a jubilant-looking Padma the next day, in the second floor corridor.

"It worked!" Padma cried, throwing her arms around Ginny in a bone-crushing hug. "It worked! Malfoy got through the Great Hall doors without kissing anyone!"

"It worked?" Ginny repeated, stunned. Padma pulled away, bouncing.

"He said to give you this," she supplied, handing Ginny a ripped piece of parchment before bounding off down the hall, a skip to her gait. Ginny unfolded the paper and read the angular scrawl.

_Should bottle and sell to turn a profit. Meet in classroom tonight._

\-------

"Alright, what's this about?" Ginny asked, settling into a chair and crossing her arms over her chest. "Fancy striking a deal?"

"Exactly," Malfoy answered, mirroring her stance. "The potion was your idea, but the end result was of my doing."

"We would have gotten it eventually," Ginny argued.

"Not without the Essence," Malfoy said.

"Then it was Snape's hand, not yours," she pointed out. Malfoy's jaw clenched.

"A split," he proposed.

"70/30," Ginny said, cocking her head to one side to study him. "My idea."

"50/50," Malfoy hissed. "My ingredient."

"Snape's ingredient," Ginny said again. "60/40, final offer."

"Done." Malfoy stuck out his hand. "Bottle it and sell it to the poor sods of this place, and have enough to buy Christmas presents with."

"I didn't think Malfoys needed profit from illegal potions to buy things," Ginny mused, though she grasped his long fingers in her own and shook anyway. His hand wasn't as cold as she thought it was going to be.

"I was talking about you," he said, smirking.

"Ha, ha," Ginny dead-panned. "So clever."

Malfoy turned to leave.

"Might want to give extra to Creevey," he called over his shoulder, as he was almost out the classroom door. "Millicent has been skipping classes to loiter at the Great Hall doors."

\--------

In the end, Colin bought two bottles, and the look on his face was worth putting up with Malfoy's demands.

"No more Bulstrode-lips!" Colin sighed, dreamily, carting off his potion to his room. Ginny kept the good-feeling with her throughout the day, and was even given several congratulatory handshakes on her way to dinner that evening. She was feeling quite good with herself when she reached the Great Hall. She even winked up at the mistletoe hanging from the arch as she passed underneath it– and was so preoccupied with looking up that she didn't realize she was running into someone.

And that the someone's lips were quite suddenly mashed against hers in an extraordinarily _not_ unpleasant way.

She pulled away in shock to find gray eyes looking down at her.

"Forget to take the potion yourself, did you?" Malfoy drawled.

"Me?" Ginny blinked. "What about you?"

There was a long pause.

"I was too busy counting my galleons–"

"I had so many people asking that I just–"

He cocked one eyebrow up.

"Think of all the other antidotes to various castle annoyances we could exploit," he said, and she couldn't help but grin.

"I do like the sound of that."

"After all," he said, lazily, one finger drawing circles on her palm, "the mistletoe isn't _all_ bad."

"Hmm," Ginny mused, eyelids fluttering closed as he leaned forward again. "Only if the person under it–"

He kissed her again, and stole her breath away, and she forgot what she was going to finish with.


End file.
